Today must be my lucky day. In my email was an Official Notice, from some lawyers I’d never heard of, announcing with great fanfare the favorable settlement of a class-action lawsuit brought on my behalf against Ticketmaster.

Anyway, I’m entitled to some coupons! For a dollar and fifty cents each! Which I can use if I decide to buy more tickets from Ticketmaster sometime in the next 4 years.

I shouldn’t get too excited though, I think I bought 2 (or maybe it was 4) tickets since 1999 when these shenanigans started. Six bucks! I’m rich! And I can only use two coupons at a time, so that means I’ll have to buy from Ticketmaster twice if I want to collect my windfall.

Feh. Class action lawsuits aren’t about remedying any “harm” which I may, or more likely may not, have endured. They’re about enriching the lawyers. I get some coupons; the lawyers get $16.5 million dollars. And the two knuckleheads who originally complained get 20 grand each for fronting the lawyers’ greed.

What a racket. And one more reason why we desperately need tort reform in this country.

It took eight years for this nonsense to wend its way through the court system. And for what? Ticketmaster didn’t admit any wrongdoing, probably because they didn’t do anything wrong. They’re going to keep charging the same fees. The whole thing is a farce.

I’d object on principle but the game is rigged in their favor. The hoops to jump through are onerous and designed to ensure their little racket can’t be derailed. Here’s the best part:

Any counsel retained by you in connection with an objection shall identify all objections they have filed to class action settlements from January 1, 2008 to present, and identify the results of each objection, including any Court opinions ruling on the objections. Objector’s counsel shall also identify if they have ever been sanctioned by a Court in connection with filing an objection.

No rabble-rousers need apply. There’s money to be extorted fees to be earned so you’d better not upset the class-action jackpot-justice gravy train. Sixteen point five million dollars. For nothing, and a couple of coupons. What a waste.

And yeah, I haven’t been posting here in a while. It was soccer season and my daughter anchored her team’s defense so my weekends were not my own. Not that you guys care about stuff like that, but John did say I could include these kind of personal notes, so there you go.